


Shared Interests

by owlsshadows



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Akaashi is beautiful, Boys Kissing, Crushes, Fluff, M/M, Sloppy Makeouts, and Akaashi harbors a crush, the moonlight playing a prominent role
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-08-14 10:10:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16490579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owlsshadows/pseuds/owlsshadows
Summary: It takes Akaashi two days to realize that he absolutely can’t take his eyes off of Kuroo.





	Shared Interests

**Author's Note:**

> Hooooo boi, this monster baby has finally been finished! I've had this idea sitting in my WIPs for so long I don't even want to think back, but it's finally out and finally here.
> 
> Basically, it started off on a much more angsty tone than how it turned out eventually, and now it's just tooth-rotting fluff.

  1. Akaashi’s case



 

_“Night, the mother of fear and mystery, was coming upon me.”_

H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds

 

It’s a gaze he accidentally catches on the first day of summer training camp; it’s a soft, caring look full of worry. It’s not addressed to him. On the contrary, it’s so intimate and honest that Akaashi feels he was not even supposed to see it.

He wishes he could cast his eyes away, but he’s mesmerized, eyes glued on the other side of the gym. The ball in his hand goes forgotten, and so does the warm up session he supposed to take part in. As he stands there on the court, aimless and awestruck, he gets hit in the face by one of Bokuto’s practice serves. The picture in front of his eyes slides, colors slipping and melting into a complete mess. Fuzzy, he trails off the court and into the caring hands of Fukurodani’s third year manager.

“I’m surprised you got hit,” says Shirofuku handing him a towel and sits next to him on the bench.

Akaashi shrugs, and the girl smiles at him.

“Need a pat or a hug?”

“Thank you, Shirofuku-san,” the boy says, lifting his hand in a sign of politely refusing the offer. “I think I will be fine.”

“Good,” Shirofuku nods before she stands up to prepare the water bottles for their teammates.

Akaashi has to sit out their first set against Nekoma due to a heavy nosebleed.

With a towel pressed against his head, Akaashi watches as the Nekoma team all gathers for their final mantra before the match.

There is a small, budding pain deep inside Akaashi’s chest as he looks over the bench on the other side of the net.

That tender, loving gaze will never be addressed to him.

It’s something reserved for that particular person and no one else.

It’s reserved for Kozume Kenma.

Kuroo Tetsurou would never look at anyone else with quite such affection.

 

*

 

It takes Akaashi two days to realize that he absolutely can’t take his eyes off of Kuroo.

In these two days, there are plenty of things Akaashi becomes aware of.

Things like, until he opens his mouth to say something stupid, Kuroo is a beautiful creature. Like how his body is proportionate and his arms and legs are long and lean. How his skin is healthy and clean, his nose is cute, and his smile is wicked yet charming, how his eyes shine intensely before a match.

Akaashi realizes that Kuroo Tetsurou is physically very attractive.

But he does not find Kuroo irresistible. At least, not until Kuroo looks at Kozume.

But when he does, comes the pain, and Akaashi’s insides go all weird.

 

*

 

The ache nesting in his chest is transparent to the eyes of the onlooker.

Yet comes the night and with it comes the roaring of tired muscles, the pain of the never-comfortable pillow and the snoring solo of Komi Haruki, accompanied by the orchestra of cicadas – and Akaashi’s mind sets images of Kuroo Tetsurou on an endless loop of repeat. Smiles and sneers and shit-eating grins flash before his open eyes; when he closes his lids, Kuroo’s voice accompanies him.

He blinks at the ceiling. He moves, turns to his side, kicks off the blankets, pulls them back again, turns to his back again, sighing.

Akaashi can’t sleep.

If only he could turn his brain off, but it’s impossible. He listens to the sounds around him, the shifting of bodies, the soft sighs and almost-snores.

He hears someone opening a bottle in the other end of the room. He hears the glugging sound of water and he can almost imagine the huge gulps of the teammate who drinks. Two minutes later he decides that the reason he is unable to sleep is because his throat is dry.

He makes his way out of the room with his empty bottle in hand and heads to the restrooms. He just passes the vending machines in the hallway when he stumbles upon the couple, snuggled up in between the juice and the coffee machine, snogging. Shirofuku is sitting on the lap of Bokuto, fingers entangled in the spiky hair of the team’s ace. Bokuto holds the manager close with one arm, the other lost who-knows-where. It is not the first time Akaashi witnesses their overly friendly demeanors – they have always been extremely close and lately they have the tendency to wrap up club gatherings with some mutual lip tasting – but it still surprises him how fearless they are; after all they don’t know when a teacher might pass by.

Akaashi clears his throat as he passes them.

They don’t notice.

The first time Akaashi saw them making out, he felt almost heartbroken.

Whether it was love he felt for Bokuto once, Akaashi is not entirely sure. By the time he realized his feelings – when Bokuto kissed Shirofuku, when their hands touched, when she plopped down in his lap on team gatherings, and his heart started to _hurt_ , it already felt almost like an afterthought. Mourning what he could have had. Lamenting on an opportunity wasted.

Did he regret it, he wonders for a second, looking back at the silhouette of the couple in the corridor. He is not quite certain. He can’t pinpoint the moment he fell for Bokuto, just like he can’t make out the moment he fell out of love.

All he knows is that what lingers. And what lingers is a faint feeling of nostalgia, a memory of two from his first year, the phantom of a touch under his skin.

With time, Akaashi got used to the sight of their self-centered, eccentric ways. Now he feels no pain. Just slight annoyance anyone would.

Akaashi enters the bathroom to fill up his bottle. Since he is already there, he takes a leak and while washing hands, he washes his face and neck as well. Even at night, the air is insufferably hot and he hates the stickiness of sweat. And maybe – just maybe – he thinks washing his face will cool his mind too, currently going on overdrive.

By the time he is on his way back, Bokuto is trailing sloppy kisses along the neck of Shirofuku and from the sounds of it, they have already passed a boundary of no return.

This time Akaashi doesn’t dare to pass them. He walks off cautiously onto another corridor, the one leading to the main hall where they usually eat.

He wanders around the empty tables aimlessly in the moonlight, drawing lines on the tabletops as he passes by. He glances at the big clock on the wall, trying to guess the time in the darkness. He should wait 10-15 minutes at least… maybe 20 would be safest, by then Bokuto might even fall asleep after returning to their common room.

Akaashi silently curses himself for not bringing his phone out with him as he drops down to one of the chairs.

He leans on the cool table. It feels refreshing in the hot weather.

He closes his eyes, thinking about the day.

He is _not_ thinking about Kuroo Tetsurou.

In his thoughts, he doesn’t find him intolerable.

Nor hateful.

Nor _sexy_.

But mostly, he doesn’t find him attainable.

He is _by no means_ agitated about his stupid crush on Kuroo.

 

  1. Kuroo’s case



 

_“Alone-- it is wonderful how little a man can do alone! To rob a little, to hurt a little, and there is the end.”_

H.G. Wells, The Invisible Man

 

Kuroo Tetsurou got kicked out of Nekoma’s sleeping quarters. Not that he committed any great atrocities – his sole sin was being too loud when Kenma wanted to sleep.

It’s not the first time it happens, Kenma shut the door in Kuroo’s face many times before when he visited the Kozume household in the early morning hours, asking Kenma to join him for a run. But never before this summer camp it happened that Kenma would want to sleep early – usually he was the last one staying awake, playing his game underneath the tent of his bedsheets.

Slightly surprised and barely hurt, Kuroo pulls his futon along the corridor with overplayed agony – not that anyone would be there to witness, but he has great sense of drama, and it’s a moment to shine, even if his only audience is the spider crawling up on its web lazily in the corner of the ceiling.

Of course he was loud. He had damn good reason to.

Every once in a while, Yaku and he would have a fight over the most trivial matters. Make it every day or so. This time, it was not even so insignificant. It was about cats after all. They found them during lunch break in the garden, a white and a black kitten, sleeping soundly in the shades of an old tree. Yaku took at least a dozen pictures of the white one, saying it was the cutest. Kuroo, partial towards the black kitten himself, couldn’t bear this level of favoritism and discrimination. He did the right thing and stood up for the black kitten.

It was around ten minutes into their heated encounter with the others joining in watching the pictures and setting up a poll, when the tired and grumpy Kenma jumped up and kicked Kuroo out of the room. And here he is, entering the unlit dining hall, pulling his half-folded futon after himself, dreading the moment he dragged Kenma into volleyball.

Not that he really regrets it. It was, and it still is up to this day, the best decision of his life. Kenma really flourishes when he is given a game to play – and since their first match against Karasuno, Kenma seems to have found his boss to beat in the chibi middle blocker Hinata Shouyou. His eyes gleam, his movements smoothen, as those of a cat set out for its prey.

This is the happiest Kuroo has ever seen Kenma in years, and he is even more motivated now to get his team into the Nationals this year. “The battle of the trash heap” would be a dream come true, a bet won, and a gift for Kenma to have his real match against that feisty little beast.

If Karasuno wins their prelims, that is.

The cafeteria seems bigger at night, darkness eating away its windows, creating an illusionary depth Kuroo feels almost lost in. It’s big, empty and hot, and silent but for the pattering sound of nails hitting the surface of a table.

“Is there anyone?” Kuroo asks, trying hard not to remember the horror movie he watched with Kenma the other day.

“Who are you?” comes the question from the darkness, slightly to the left from where Kuroo stands.

“Nekoma’s Kuroo,” he supplies the answer. Even if the creature nesting in the darkness is a ghost or a ghoul, it deserves good manners.

“Ah, Kuroo,” the voice says.

A chair gets pulled, a table pushed a bit as the creature emerges, and with every movement it makes, Kuroo is more and more sure that it’s an actual high school volleyball player just like himself.

Then suddenly, as if the veil of darkness has just been lifted, the boy steps close enough for Kuroo not only to see but to recognize him.

“Akaashi.”

“Ossu,” the boy greets, deep sea green eyes gleaming in the night. “What are you doing here at this hour, Kuroo-san?”

Kuroo loves the wits and perseverance of Akaashi Keiji. The second year is aging fast under the pressure to keep Bokuto in check, but he does it so well, maturing with every obstacle instead of bending under their weight. It’s hateful and admirable at the same time.

In order to bring Bokuto back from his dejected mode, Akaashi is able to manipulate the entire court and all the players to move the way he wants. Kuroo is taken aback every time he sees it.

He wishes Akaashi would look at him with the same patience he looks at Bokuto, but it seems like life is cruel to him, and the boy hates his guts. Not that Akaashi shows any mercy to Bokuto – if possible, he is his harshest critique – but Akaashi would never kick _his_ _captain_ out of the room where the whole team sleeps solely for the reason that he was _loud_.

"I was banned from our quarters" Kuroo says, and he is smirking as he lifts his futon. "You?" 

"I sneaked out for water, and got a little stranded." Akaashi murmurs, lifting his bottle. "Bokuto and Shirofuku started their business out in the hallway."

Kuroo gets the hint. He also gets the bitter tone in Akaashi's voice.

"So you– for Bokuto–” he starts, trailing off. It’s not good manners to pry into someone else’s private matters, especially if that someone else seems to have a dislike for the asker.

Akaashi croaks in reply, shrugging ever so slightly.

"Something like that," he says.

"Oh." Kuroo comes to a full stop, dropping his futon beside him. "We share something then," he adds, seconds later. 

"Share?"

There’s no darkness dark enough to mask the intensity of Akaashi’s expression – he could pierce a hole into Kuroo’s face.

"Our interest," Kuroo smiles. "We’re both a little gay for Bokuto." 

Akaashi flinches. It seems there’s something on his mind that’s wanting to come out, but he keeps it in, schooling his expression into that of mild curiosity instead.

"What do you like in him?" Akaashi asks. 

Kuroo plops down on the futon, flattening the edges and patting the space beside him ushering Akaashi to sit too. When the setter finally does, Kuroo lays back with his arms folded under his head, staring at the ceiling for a while before answering. 

"I love how his entire being is honest. There is no pretense in anything he does."

"Hn," Akaashi agrees. “Except when you remind him of the money he owes you,” he adds, a small smile playing on his lips.

This is the moment the moon choses to come out of its hideout behind the clouds, tinting the cafeteria with pale white light. The illusion of endlessness diminishes as tables, chairs, walls manifest from the darkness.

Lastly, the moonshine falls on Akaashi’s face. He seems calm and eerily beautiful painted milky white. Like some ageless god or a marble sculpture in a museum.

"And you?" Kuroo asks, question slipping his tongue before his mind could catch up.

Akaashi blinks in response, taken aback by the mutual comeback. Kuroo tips his head back, easing himself into a comfortable position from where he can still see Akaashi well. He grants Akaashi a moment to breathe, to collect his thoughts, to come up with his reply. In return, Kuroo also gets a moment to admire Akaashi’s perfect features, and the adorable little wrinkle between Akaashi’s furrowed brows.

"I guess it was his energy,” Akaashi speaks finally, voice low and tone lamenting, tasting every word on his lips before ejecting them into the night. “It always felt as if he had some kind of a gravity that drawn me closer and closer. He does things in his own pace, forces everyone to follow suit, and the funny thing is, everyone does so willingly."

“True that,” Kuroo replies, and they fall in silence.

Akaashi spares Kuroo a smile, small and simple, before he lies down beside him facing the ceiling.

It’s comfortable, not saying a word for a while.

The moonshine soaks into Akaashi’s skin, glowing from within. Kuroo finds himself looking, forgetting his eyes on the sharp edge of Akaashi’s jawline, drawing his glance along his cheekbone, lingering at the curve of his lips. There, a tiny smile resides, looking almost sad in contrast with his deep, shining eyes.

"What are you thinking about?" Kuroo asks.

“Things,” Akaashi replies, his little smile turning into a frown.

“What things?”

The words fall on their own from his lips, mesmerized by the beauty of Akaashi in the moonlight.

"Like how it's true that the more you want something the less chance you have to obtain it, whereas the moment you are ready to leave it it's suddenly yours," Akaashi murmurs, turning to face Kuroo.

"Pardon me asking.”

Akaashi laughs curtly, reaching out and tracing a finger along the perimeter of Kuroo’s face, never quite touching him.

“In other words, I’ve been thinking about you.”

 

  1. Akaashi’s case



 

_“I felt now that my life was practically lost, and that persuasion made me capable of daring anything.”_

H.G. Wells, The Island of Dr. Moreau

 

Akaashi finds the moon and the clouds to have conspired against him, turning the cafeteria pitch black the moment he glances to the side to catch Kuroo’s expression.

But what eyes can’t see, ears can – clothes rustling as Kuroo starts, the high pitched sound of a breath that gets hitched in Kuroo’s throat, the whoosh of air filtering through the distance between them as Kuroo moves.

They are close enough for Akaashi to make Kuroo’s body mass out of the surrounding darkness, he sees Kuroo propping up on his elbow.

“Me?” he hears a deep, low voice full of surprise.

“You,” Akaashi repeats, and inwardly curses the moon for providing light only after he drew his hand back.

“What was it again?” Kuroo asks. “The moment you’re ready to leave it it’s suddenly yours?”

“I didn’t mean to say that you’re mine, Kuroo-san,” Akaashi says, and he can’t fight a smile off his face. “You’re of course your own person.”

“Thanks–”

“One can’t simply own another.”

“You might wish to travel a bit back in time to remind the folks who invented slavery,” Kuroo laughs, dropping back to the futon. “Also the people who write those sappy love songs. All those ‘you’re mine till the end of time’ crap is hurting my ears. All in all, you have a lot of visits to pay,” he says rolling back on his back. “But for real. What do you mean by that?”

“I just find it curious,” Akaashi says. “Bumping into you of all people here.”

“Does it bear any importance that it’s me?”

Akaashi turns his head towards the voice.

Kuroo’s eyes are curious, open, mesmerizing. He faces Akaashi with his whole body turned in his way. He tucks one arm under his face, his temple pressed against his forearm. His other hand lays in the delicate distance between them, resting in a way it can be moved immediately. His torso, long and lean, follows a wave coated in silvery light, curving ever so slightly around his hips. His long legs probably reach beyond the end of the futon.

Akaashi has nothing much to lose. At this point, he won’t worry for sleepless nights after a failed confession – his nights are restless anyway, dreaming about Kuroo both with eyes closed and open. He knows that his reputation, if he has such a thing, is not at risk. No matter what he does beyond this point, Kuroo won’t tell a soul. His sanity, he has last seen it on the first day of the camp. Then it fled, the moment his eyes caught glimpse of Kuroo’s soft gaze aimed at Kenma, leaving a mess of a person behind. His health, it may receive some damage if he decides to go for it and Kuroo decides to hit him in reply. Akaashi doubts it would happen, though. He has nothing much to lose.

“Yes,” he replies.

“Did you… give up on me, Akaashi?”

The question, phrased oh-so-carefully, leaves lips that are pressed paper thin the next moment, out of either momentary hesitation or regret.

Akaashi rolls to his side, reaching out, placing a finger on Kuroo’s hand tentatively. When Kuroo doesn’t flinch, Akaashi lays another finger down, and another. Finally, he lets gravity pull his palm against the back of Kuroo’s hand.

“I never even allowed myself to fall for you.”

“So it was not about me, but a comparison,” Kuroo says, a small smile appearing on his face. It seems somewhat sad but sympathetic –

– but Kuroo doesn’t understand a thing –

– and Akaashi finds it insincere to agree with Kuroo.

_… the more you want something the less chance you have to obtain it, whereas the moment you’re ready to leave it it's suddenly yours._

There was no comparison there.

There was no one Akaashi wanted badly before – even his love for Bokuto mellowed into something platonic before Akaashi could realize he was feeling it at all. His feelings for Bokuto, as of now, are mostly those of parental worry or something a big brother would feel for the baby of the family.

There is no one else Akaashi wants but Kuroo – he wants him since the moment he caught glimpse of Kuroo’s gaze, so full of caring, love and kindness. He wants Kuroo since the moment he forgot his eyes on him, since he came to the realization that Kuroo is hot. He wants Kuroo, and he wants him bad, like no one else before – but Kuroo –

– his eyes would always find Kenma, and Kenma alone.

So Akaashi decided to fight it, to let these feelings be washed away. He walked to the cafeteria with the aim to get rid of his feelings. They were annoying, stuffy and persistent. _And then the subject of his affections just had to waltz right in._

Akaashi takes a short breath, pushing himself up on his elbow. He lets his fingers slide down Kuroo’s hand below his, slip in between Kuroo’s fingers and give them a squeeze.

“There was no comparison,” he says.

“So you really did give up on me?” Kuroo asks, amused.

“I was planning to.”

“Even though you didn’t allow yourself to fall for me?”

“Sometimes things that we won’t allow still happen,” Akaashi bites his lips.

“Do they?” Kuroo asks, sounding just as teasing as he sounds inviting.

Akaashi has developed extraordinary analytical skills working together with the double edged sword that is Bokuto Koutaro. These skills, so fine and refined, are searching meticulously for the right answer to the situation at hand.

Akaashi identifies the problem to be the playful tone – it makes his skin itch and his resolve wanes with every sound, every vibration.

Akaashi finds the source of the problem to be Kuroo Tetsurou – who smirks in the faint moonlight, looking all smug and just a little surprised, and in entirety way more attractive than it should be allowed.

Akaashi feels lost, heart submerging into a syrupy mix of feelings. His brain, on the other hand, never stops working; his analytical skills provide him with three possible solutions.

One, he smacks Kuroo. That would shut him up, if temporarily, and as a side effect it may even prove solution to the attractiveness of Kuroo –

– but what if this vile creature looks even better with a crooked nose, that Akaashi would certainly like to avoid.

Two, he plasters his hands over Kuroo’s lips to stop him from spouting further nonsense, says what he needs to say, and returns to the Fukurodani room as soon as possible, leaving the consequences to tomorrow’s Akaashi to deal with –

– hoping that enough time has passed and he won’t run into Bokuto and Shirofuku. Also, it might rouse Kuroo to chase after Akaashi. Too many unwanted possible outcomes.

Three, he gives in.

It’s not the most gallant of alternatives – really. Akaashi could come up with more elegant solutions to his pending dilemma but once his brain reaches the third alternative it refuses to cooperate any further, supplying him with suggestive imagery at which his resolve simply crumbles.

“Tell me you don’t get kicked out of the room every day,” Akaashi mumbles, leaning over Kuroo.

“I don’t,” Kuroo replies, taking a sharp inhale. “Of course I don’t. I have, in fact, a very good relationship with my team, and Kenma usually stays up all night playing games, so that he now decided to sleep early and thought that I was too loud was an entirely new experience to me.”

“You’re blabbering, Kuroo-san. Are you nervous?” Akaashi leans closer, hovering above Kuroo’s head.

Their eyes meet, one frantic, one calm.

“Why would I?”

“Have you ever kissed a boy, Kuroo-san?” Akaashi asks.

“Did you?” Kuroo asks back, glance dancing between Akaashi’s slightly open lips and his heavy lidded eyes.

“I did.”

“Ah. With whom–”

“Can I kiss you, Kuroo-san?” Akaashi cuts in.

“Wha…yeah,” Kuroo replies.

 

  1. Kuroo’s case



 

_“It sounds plausible enough tonight, but wait until tomorrow. Wait for the common sense of the morning.”_

H.G. Wells, The Time Machine

 

Akaashi Keiji is a talented bastard. Be it the way he handles a volleyball or the way his tongue glides over the palate of Kuroo’s mouth, he knows how to twist things just the right way.

He is a tactical bastard as well, slanting his lips against Kuroo’s again and again, stealing his breath away and melting him into the futon – and Kuroo falls, blinded by the moonshine and the boy leaning over him, and he groans – the deep guttural sound stuck in the back of his throat a struggle lost to keep his composure – and his hands that he kept carefully by his side shoot up, disappearing in the soft, deliciously soft curls of Akaashi’s hair.

Kuroo has never kissed a boy before. He dreamt about it a few times; mostly after heated debates with Yaku, or in moments when Bokuto was so stupidly genius he just really wanted to kiss his handsome face. If you do not count that one terribly failed attempt back in the last year of middle school that took his confidence away for good measure, he has never even kissed for real.

Looking at it from this angle, it feels infuriating, just how good Akaashi kisses him now, soft and eager at the same time, teasing Kuroo just enough to get him all riled up. It should not be allowed for someone younger to have the obvious advantage in experience and technique, yet Kuroo feels utterly useless, imitating but never quite reciprocating Akaashi’s movements.

Just when Kuroo finally feels like he has gotten the jist of it, kissing Akaashi with no more teeth clashing, and actually matching the boy’s rhythm for once, Akaashi blows onto the wet lips of Kuroo, who can’t help but whimper.

The smile appearing on Akaashi’s lips is the most beautiful, yet the vilest thing Kuroo has ever seen.

“Are you showing off?” Kuroo asks.

“Are you impressed?”

Damn he is. It would be useless to lie, not after a kiss like this. Kuroo grumbles in reply, pulling Akaashi down to him again.

“Eager, aren’t we?” Akaashi laughs into their kiss, bopping Kuroo’s nose in the process with his own.

“Hey, this was not my idea,” Kuroo replies.

“But you like it,” Akaashi dips his head, nudging Kuroo to bare his neck for him.

Kuroo tilts his head, hands running down from Akaashi’s hair onto his shoulder, fingers sneaking under his pajama shirt sneakily. Akaashi laughs, biting down into the skin made available for him. Kuroo whines and grumbles, short nails digging into the muscles of Akaashi’s shoulder.

“Undoubtedly,” he breathes.

“I’m glad,” Akaashi hums, gliding his tongue along Kuroo’s neck.

Feeling all ticklish and numb at the same time, feeling that it is too much to bear, Kuroo opens his eyes slightly. The moonlit cafeteria greets him with its eerie lights and tangible silence.

“Why me though?”

The question slips from his lips as nothing but a sigh, barely enough for Akaashi to pick up, but way too loud for all the empty space around them.

Akaashi stops in his ministrations all too sudden, and Kuroo curses himself for his foolish question. In his moonlit glory, Akaashi hovers above him with a strange glint to his eyes – he looks at Kuroo heartbreakingly soft and unbearably exposed.

“Does the reason matter?” he asks.

Kuroo reaches up, cupping Akaashi’s face between his hands, and his heart swells with feelings he cannot put a tag on quite yet – all he knows is that the moonshine paints Akaashi eerily beautiful and fragile. All he knows, is that he wants to hold his face and look at it for a while – more than a fleeting, heated moment in the night, through lids heavy with sleep and a brain oozing with fatigue. All that he knows, is that whatever he wants from Akaashi, is more than a sloppy make out session in the empty cafeteria, where he ended up by chance and Akaashi by bad luck. All he knows, is that for whatever reason, Akaashi was happy to see him and wanted to kiss him. And for now, that much may just be enough.

“No. Not really,” he replies. “I just want to know if… if I can have more of this.”

“This?” Akaashi asks, brows lifted.

“This,” Kuroo replies, propping up on his elbow and planting a chaste kiss on Akaashi’s lips.

“This,” Akaashi repeats. His voice is barely a whisper, toneless, voiceless gush of air ghosting about Kuroo’s lips.

“Whether it’s a sudden infatuation, or a long-harbored crush…” Kuroo starts, his nerves and embarrassment stealing his words out of his mouth.

Akaashi smiles in reply, not quite admitting to either.

“I can be very oblivious when it comes to feelings, but… I think I would like if this could be a _thing_ , you know,” Kuroo finishes.

“A _thing_ ,” Akaashi replies, and his eyes search Kuroo’s eyes with something akin to the thrill little children feel upon laying their eyes on the heap of presents under the Christmas tree in those horrendous American family movies they screen every December. Kuroo cannot quite place it, but he is unable to tear his eyes away from it too. Akaashi seems fascinated, if not excited. “I think I would like that too.”

 

*

 

Kuroo wakes to the sound of the coffee machine, accompanied by the smell of roasted coffee beans. It feels warm and comfy, until he realizes that he is not at home, where he can hear his mother make her morning coffee if he left his door slightly open, but at a training camp. As he cracks his eyes open, he can see a pair of pink slippers scoot across his sphere of vision to the table where they keep the sugar and the coffee creamer. Then, something moves against his back, and suddenly he is very aware of everything that happened the night before.

His eyes open wide and his heart rate doubles as he scoots into a sitting position on the futon. Behind him, he can feel Akaashi stirring the same.

“I was wondering where you ended up when you didn’t come back to the room last night,” greets the owner of the pink slippers, Kai, stirring his coffee nonchalantly.

Kuroo looks from his vice-captain to Akaashi, who looks way too good for someone who just woke up, then back to his vice-captain rapidly.

“Listen we can explain,” Kuroo starts.

“You don't really need to, I have eyes,” Kai replies, taking a sip of his coffee and flashing out his phone.

On the screen, Kuroo is greeted by a wonderfully shot picture of two teenage boys, all tangled up in one big mass of limbs and blanket. While Akaashi’s face looks angelic in his sleep, Kuroo wears a frown in the picture – and a hickey, bright purple against his skin, blooms on his neck.

“Ugh,” he comments.

“I don’t usually go for photos, but you looked so cute I had to,” Kai says.

“Can you please delete it?” Kuroo begs.

“I want it,” Akaashi cuts in. “Please send it to me, Kai-san.”

“Alright,” Kai turns the screen back towards himself, thumb flying over it in rapid motions. “I sent it to you too, Kuroo.”

“Thanks, man.”

“Now, if you don’t mind, I’m off to my morning duties,” Kai smiles with both eyes closed, then stands and leaving his used cup in the dishwasher walks out of the cafeteria.

Kuroo slumps back to the futon, covering his eyes with both arms. He has so many things to say, yet–

“He means poop,” is the first thing that comes out his mouth. “That’s what morning duties are. He hogs the booth for half an hour.”

He hears Akaashi’s chuckle – such a wonderful, soft sound.

“Kai-san has good sense for photography.”

Kuroo opens his mouth to ask Akaashi not to remind him of the physical evidence of his horrendous sleeping face, but the boy continues and the words get stuck in Kuroo’s throat.

“I’m glad that my phone is back in the room, otherwise I would just stare at that photo when I have you right here to look at.”

“Ugh,” Kuroo gives out a pained sigh, sitting back up again. “You’d better return to your room though,” he says. “If we don’t want everyone to know of this immediately.”

“You’re right, it would make things complicated for the training camp,” Akaashi agrees. His thoughtful expression moves something in Kuroo, his stomach churns painfully.

 _Cute_.

Even his bedhead is so effortlessly charming.

“Oh god,” Kuroo says then. “Are we a thing now?”

“I think so,” Akaashi replies, scratching the back of his head sheepishly.

“Good,” Kuroo nods.

“Hn,” Akaashi hums.

“… we won’t show any mercy on the court though,” Kuroo adds after careful thinking.

“No mercy.”

“And for… uh, for dates. We can meet up on the weekends?” Kuroo offers. “I’m sure once I graduate and get into Tokyo Uni, I will be much closer so it would be much easier to–”

“Sounds wonderful,” Akaashi cuts in, laying a hand on Kuroo’s. “Now, can I get a good morning kiss, Kuroo?”

“Did you just drop the honorifics?” Kuroo leans in to meet Akaashi’s lips halfway.

“What should I do?” Akaashi asks, following the kiss with a quick peck, then standing from the futon. “Call you senpai, all affectionately?”

“Ugh, no.”

“Tetsurou, then?”

“That doesn’t sound that bad.”

“Hn,” Akaashi nods. “See you at the morning matches then,” he says, then, ears dusted pink, he adds: “Tetsurou.”

Kuroo watches as the boy walks away briskly with a flaming face himself.

“See you, Keiji.”


End file.
